Eagle River’s Sam Horning competes in the boys 100 yard freestyle race at the BHS/CHS Invitational on Saturday, Oct. 7, 2017 at the Bartlett High pool. Horning finished second in the race. (Star photo by Matt Tunseth)

Local swimmers make a splash

Eagle River’s John Heaphy won two individual events for the Eagle River boys, while Izzy Powers and Cheyenne Burke led a solid day for the Chugiak girls at the Chugiak/Bartlett Invitational Swimming and Diving Meet at Chugiak and Bartlett High.

Heaphy won the 200 yard individual medley and 100 breaststroke for the Wolves, who also got a second-place finish from Sam Horning in the 100 freestyle. Horning and Heaphy also joined Daniel Min and Kevin Fast to win the 200 freestyle relay.

Powers won the 50 free and finished second in the 100 butterfly, while Burke was second in both the 50 free and 100 backstroke. The duo teamed up with Addison Morgan and Leslie Cockreham to win both the 200 freestyle relay and the 200 medley relay for the Mustangs.

ERHS shooters with another shutout

Eagle River’s riflery team notched its second shutout in as many matches, knocking off East 7-0 on Friday, Oct. 6. Ava Perkins and Daniel Foshee had match-high 283’s for the Wolves, who got a 282 from Ashtin Bennett and a 281 from Maddie Bidinger.

Chugiak girls place at state tennis

The team of Rebecca LaRue and Tyanna Melak finished second at the state high school tennis tournament Oct. 6-7 at the Alaska Club East in Anchorage.

LaRue and Melak received a first-round bye. They dispatched the Juneau-Douglas team of Madisyn Carter and Olivia Moore in the second round, 6-3, 6-2, before knocking off Service’s Clarisse and Claudine Mock in the semifinals, 6-1, 6-2.

The Chugiak duo’s run came to an end in the state title match against sisters Kate and Layna Debenham of Dimond, who took the championship 6-2, 6-2.

Chugiak’s Emilee Groth also competed at state, winning her final three matches to claim fourth place.

Groth lost her opening match to Service’s Sofia Main, 2-6, 3-6 to fall into the consolation bracket. There, she knocked off Colony’s Maryssa Scarcello (6-0-6-1) and Lathrop’s Helen Wharton (6-1-6-0) before rallying to survive the 4th/6th place match against Palmer’s Shiho Hatanaka. Groth dropped the opening set 5-7 before winning the second set 6-1 and taking the tiebreaker 10-6.

Fritz wins grueling Girdwood Marathon

Former Eagle River High standout Lauren Fritz won the women’s division and placed fourth overall in the 2nd Annual Girdwood Trail Marathon Saturday, Oct. 7 in Girdwood.

Fritz, a 2006 ERHS grad, finished the 24.7-mile loop course in 4 hours, 5 minutes, 10 seconds to best Julie Johnson by more than 20 minutes. Rachel Steer was third in 4:38:52.

The race was run on what organizers described as “challenging” trails around the Girdwood Valley. The trail lived up to its description, as four of the 36 competitors dropped out and more than half of those who finished took more than five hours to complete the course. Miles Raney won the overall race in 3:53:20, followed by Matias Saari (3:57:02) and Soren Wuerth (4:03:18). By comparison, Saari won the 2016 Equinox Marathon — an official 26.2-mile marathon course considered one of the more difficult in the country — in a time more than an hour faster than his time Saturday in Girdwood.